Untreated: How Ignoring Mental Illness Cost Us All

ROCKY MOUNTAIN PBS I-NEWS Mental illness in Colorado costs some $5.4 billion each year – or about $1,000 for every resident of the state, according to an analysis by Rocky Mountain PBS I-News. A large part of these costs are related to untreated mental illness. The billions in lost wages, preventable medical expenses, and jail and prison costs dwarf the $730 million the state is deliberately spending on care. Hear from Pueblo jailers who say mentally ill inmates cost more and stay longer, and are often kept in solitary confinement. Meet a mother in Grand Junction who had to leave her seven-year-old son in a psychiatric hospital 300 miles away in January, because no other bed was available.

Rocky Mountain PBS I-News

Learn why some of the newest efforts to cut medical costs in the state are focusing on mental health, and why intervention remains such a difficult task. “UNTREATED” will change the way you think about one of the biggest public health crises we face.